“Do you have nightmares?” Weston asked. He noted her blush as they passed under a street lamp.
“I’m afraid so,” Lady Valor said. “They cannot be helped.”
“I’ll help,” Weston said.
The duke chose to ignore any hint of his daughter being in a position to be helped by a gentleman in the middle of the night.
Weston went on to explain that he had wondered if the count had a foreign spy in his household, thereby leading to the mention in the newspaper. He speculated that the count had become suspicious of him and wished to eliminate him for that reason. Perhaps the count had even imagined he was in contact with the spy in his household.
Lord Ledderbey said, “Well all of this has been very unfortunate, and terribly frightening for Lady Valor, which I cannot like. But I wonder if we might be led by Shakespeare’s wise words—all is well that ends well.”
“And Papa,” Lady Valor said, “your dream of an empty house has finally come true.”
“Ah yes, that,” the duke said.
Weston did not think he looked quite as enthusiastic as one might when one’s dream had come true.
They walked on in silence for a few minutes. Weston walked along Lady Valor’s sedan, his hand resting on the side of it. Lady Valor put his hand over his, which he was hoping she would do.
“What do you suppose will become of the count?” Lord Ledderbeysaid.
“He ought to be hanged,” Weston said. “He’s in league with the French. It was even in the newspapers, so I am not the only one that knows it, and now the Crown has him.”
“As to that,” the duke said, “it has recently come to my attention that our housekeeper put that bit in the newspaper. She was afraid our Val would end up miserable in Sardinia, all because the count was promising a quiet life in Hertfordshire.”
“I frighten easily,” Lady Valor said.
“Yes, I know,” Weston said with a laugh. “But you came through it tonight.”
She nodded. “Still, very dear of Mrs. Right to try to save me from a terrible decision, even if I never would have done it.”
“You’ll find, Tramondeley, that there is nothing our Mrs. Right won’t do for her girls.”
“I’ll say,” Weston said, a little alarmed that a housekeeper would take such steps. “Though I will soon prove that di Compressio was just as Mrs. Right speculated. I’ve sent the sketches of him to Cornwall to confirm that it was he snooping around down there, attempting to locate the Mosquito. I am also sure he had discovered it was me. That’s why he came with the knife. He’ll come to the bad end he deserves.”
The duke laughed. “I do not think the count will pay too high a price. The whole thing will be hushed up and he’ll be sent home. The Crown will probably take his English estate and explain to him that he is persona non grata.”
“Papa! Why would they let him go?”
“Because he attempted a murder at the prince’s fête, which was advertised as an honor to the exiled French nobility. Can you imagine the talk that would go round? The prince had invited a murderous agent in the employ of Napoleon to mingle with French nobility?”
Weston took that in and saw the sense in it. The count wouldprobably keep his life, as unfair as that was. However, he would never set foot in England again.
Far more importantly, he was an engaged man. What a night.
A new thought suddenly occurred to him. “I believe in circumstances such as these, the lady receives a token of affection from the gentleman.” He reached into his coat pocket and handed Lady Valor the velvet box.
She opened it. “Look, Papa, it is a sapphire necklace. It is simply perfect.”
“Well done, Tramondeley,” the duke said.
Receiving the necklace necessitated a stop to the sedan chairs to put it on, despite Lady Valor already wearing a necklace. Once that procedure was complete, they set off for home.
*
Lord Tramondeley hadseen Valor and her father home and then the duke had invited him and Lord Ledderbey inside for a brandy as it was still on the early side of things.
As it happened, Valor had a brandy too. It was not her usual drink, but she felt some combination of shaken and swashbuckling after the evening she’d had.
